I have a great idea which is the solution for the housing shortage. An interesting article that I received was talking about the housing shortage. And it said that the biggest challenge that today’s housing markets faces is the shortage of inventory for sale.

The Home Inventory is low

Okay, as a Realtor, I am aware that inventory of existing homes is extremely low. And I can also see that there is a shortage of housing. After all, normally the market has a six month supply of homes for sale. And currently, it’s less than a four months supply. As a matter of fact, this is what is causing the home prices to continue to rise.

So here’s my great idea for a housing shortage solution.

Build more homes!

Sounds simple, huh? Why didn’t anyone else come up with this idea? There has to be a reason, so let’s look a little further.

Maybe it’s not so simple

Another article told me that currently, the home building industry has a severe shortage of qualified construction workers. In fact, it said that between carpenters, electricians, plumbers and all of the other tradespeople necessary to build a home, there are 250,000 available jobs in this country. And it predicts that a few years down the road, that number will be 750,000 jobs!

It seem that during the housing crash, many construction workers left the business and went into other lines of work. And many have since retired. In addition, not enough young people have entered the business to make up the shortage of skilled workers. So, even if the developers can find the land, can get the necessary financing and get the permits which allow them to build, they don’t have the workers to do the job.

What’s the Solution?

Frankly I don’t know. Me, I’m too old to enter that field now. But if I was… After all, people I do know are making good wages working in the trades. The Monmouth County Vocational School District will train people in these fields, and many business will hire apprentices, but it seems that not enough people are willing to do this work. Maybe they all want to sit behind a desk and work with spreadsheets rather than work with their hands.

Bottom Line

But if you do want to find a home, call us. Call Bunny and Art Reiman – Realtors. We’ll work real hard to find you one. And if you want to sell a home and help with the housing shortage solution, we can help with that also.